Monday, January 27, 2014

Sazerac's Funny Numbers

As we all know, there is a shortage of old whiskey. Whiskey producers are dropping age statements left and right. Sometimes age statements just disappear, other times they are replaced by something else, like Macallan's color scheme. Lately, however, it appears that a deceptive new tactic is being practiced by Sazerac, the parent company of the Buffalo Trace, Barton and Bowman distilleries.

Very Old Barton is a popular six year old bourbon available in Kentucky and adjacent states. It's known and loved for being a high quality, affordable bourbon. New bottles of Barton no longer say 6 years old, but they still prominently display a 6 on the neck label. Similarly, this newly approved label for Old Charter, formerly an 8 year old bourbon, now simply shows a number 8 without stating it is "8 years old." This is similar to what Sazerac did a few years ago when they introduced Ancient Ancient Age 10 Star. There is a 10 year old Ancient Ancient Age which is quite popular but getting harder to find. It is very easy to mistake the 10 Star for the 10 year old.

I contacted Sazerac and they had the following comment:

We have moved some brands away from age declared statements because delivering a consistent taste profile is more important than the age statement to our customers. In the case of Old Charter, sometimes that means 8 years old, sometimes 9, sometimes 7. We were finding that we had barrels that were 7 years and 10 months old that tasted closer to standard than barrels at 8 years and 3 months but could not use them due to the age statement and consequently in these tight inventory times we were running our customers out of stock. That issue is now solved. That being said, Old Charter will continue to average 8 years old for the foreseeable future and the same can be said about VOB, it will continue to be a 6 year old whiskey for the foreseeable future.

They also told me, "At this time, we do not have plans to remove age statements from any other brands."

I'm not thrilled with the growing scarcity of age statements, but I understand it and appreciate the dilemma that distillers are in. However, replacing the age with just a number is dishonest and unworthy of a company like Sazerac. It's true that there are other whiskeys that use number designations, but most of them, such as Jack Daniel's Old No. 7 and Maker's 46, never had an age statement.

If Sazerac wants the flexibility to use younger whiskey, they should take the number off the bottle altogether. What they are doing is deception pure and simple, and they should knock it off. Then again, maybe they were just sore at being left off of my Worst Whiskey Company of the year award for 2013 and are trying to get an early start for this year's competition.

15 comments:

Anonymous
said...

Age statements are silly. A whiskey is ready when it's ready. When you order a steak and they serve it to you, are you more concerned about how long they applied heat to it? Or that it came out the way you wanted it?

Anyone who used to love Weller Special Reserve and Old Weller Antique when they were both 7 years old know what a crock that flavor profile nonsense is. Those whiskeys are not even close to what they used to be and I would bet are barely 5-6 years old. Within a year or two you won't even recognize Old Charter (not that I liked it anyway) and VOB (which I did like).

Thanks Sku. Now if only Tim Read will lay in to them like he did Parker :)

I feel a bit conflicted about BT - on one hand I love some of their usually very affordable products, but crap like this makes me want to stick to 4 Roses/WT. Heaven Hill already pulled the D*** move of jacking up the price replacing EC18 with the increasingly expensive 20, 21, etc., but at least they were honest about it - and put out the great, and afforable ECBP.

As popular as some of their stuff is though, taking it out on them with my wallet feels about like the Simpsons when Moe steals Homer's "Flaming Homer" drink idea, when Homer has to yell over a horde of thirsty people with their money out to Moe that Moe just lost himself a customer. At least I can't find the 2 items I'd pick up regularly (Weller 12 and ET Lee).

Fight the Good Fight Sku. The dropping of age statements, and the substitution of numbers is just another way to sell inferior product for the same or more money. The BS about "flavor profile" is just another way of calling the customer stupid -- ie too dumb to know the difference.